December 24, 2002

Let us observe a moment of silence...

Hmm, two of the koi died a few days ago. Yes, I know, the ones I'm in charge of, before you start gloating at my inept handling of the koi and telling me "toldja!", listen to my defense at least.

First, I seem to be able to do very little, due to some oversight by my mom that leaves me away either at training or school during the times I should be feeding the fish and watching them for signs of sickness.

Second, the fish did NOT fall sick during MY WATCH. They fell sick/ bruised themselves, whatever they did, during the time I was away in Kunming. Just proves how bad my substitutes are, hah! Even I, limited by my time schedule as I was, did not let my charges fall to any afflictions, but I am gone, 3 weeks, and wa la! The fish, they fall sick! So I only had charge of them for a week before that, so what? Pah... technicalities, technicalities, I'm just good and caring to the fish, that's all.

Christmas is one day away, too bad I got my christmas present from my mom already. Got a pool table, for those of you unloyal fans who have not been reading the past few entries *ahem* (that's your cue to start flippin' to the past few entries you missed.). Anyway, what I'd really like is a dumbwaiter, my room is on one end of the house, above the kitchen/washing area, and the stairs are at the other end. So I have to walk from one end to the other end of the house and back again. Of course, if we got a dumbwaiter, that would be no problem, drinks would be a flash, so would clothes to be taken to washing. But nooo, my mom tells me I am lazy! Bah, Thum Bingming is never lazy, efficient, that's what I am! Looking for the way to a shorter time used! That's what I do.

Argh, I'll just wait till next christmas, it's only a year away anyway... Just have to be patient... patience... patience... only a year and a day more...

Posted by Ming at 12:19 PM | Comments (0)

LOTR:TTT

Watched LOTR:TTT on Saturday with a bunch of AP guys/gals. Pretty good movie. And my favourite character, Duke Elrond, bearer of one of the elven rings *ahem*, appeared again! Yay! Gimli was very funny in the movie, much better than the first movie. And then there was Legolas, who somehow NEVER seemed to run out of arrows, even when he was distinctly down to one arrow, he was back to a full quiver in the next scene. I also get the disctinct image that Sam and Frodo are gay, buuut I could be wrong on that one. The Ents were really cool too. But then compared to the treemen in Warhammer, it's a LOT better. Possibly if they come out in resin, I may use them in place of the wood elf treemen, which look horrible. The plot deviated quite a bit from the book, most of the deviations did not appeal to me. Still it was overall better than the first movie.

Injured my arm yesterday, I suspect from the gym. Sooo, I couldn't do the christmas swim today, oh well. Ony 100 X 100s @ 1'30. Somehow, I don't think I'm missing out on much...

Posted by Ming at 11:35 AM | Comments (0)

December 20, 2002

Kunming 2002

Came back from Kunming a few days ago, haven't had the time to update my blog recently, was caught up in various activities and was playing pool the other half of the time. :) My mom got us a pool table since we won't be getting that BIG TV to occupy the BIG room downstairs. Of course, I'm completely horrible at pool... Being gifted and trained for a different type of pool altogether.

Watched Harry Potter the day before I left for Kunming, I though it was so much better than the first one, which comepltely wasn't worth my money... I liked the Basilisk, although I'm still adament that most basilisks are protrayed as lizards and I refuse to change my views! Plus, Emma Watson is pretty cute.

The first week of Kunming wasn't so bad, of course except for the fact that the water was so COLD! Of course, Wasn't so bad means everyone was swimming at a moderate pace, getting used to the climate and I was struggling like crazy just to keep up. BUT! I managed to keep up. Heh heh! After that, they started swimming fast and I died trying to keep up, falling sick the middle of the second week. Not very sick, but enough to make me stop halfway through some of the harder training sets.

I got better by the third week, but I joined the upper-middle group, which seems to consist of some of the lower Red and White members and some of the upper Yellow Suns(Or is that Rays?? Can never tell the diff. Which ever is the higher one. :P) And I was doing quite well there. Well, as in the fastest... hee hee. :D At least I could keep up there, back with the Red and White, I was barely making the times. As in BARELY. Of course, the fact that Jed and Lionel were zooming past me and overtaking me half the time DID NOT HELP!

Spent the rest of the time there playing Bridge, chinese chess or chess mostly. My chinese chess became pretty good, became more or less second best, next to Zhi Loong... Grrr... Incidentally, I was the only one who would play him more than once and as a result I became quite good quite fast. So, the rest times were quite fun, I also taught some of them to play transfer chinese chess. We didn't have enough chess sets to play transfer chess, having only one, sadly.

Our first and only Movie night was on the first Wednesday there. Adn we watched Ali. Which no one except me understood. So there was this constant stream of guys and girls going in and out. Those who had been in and didn't understand would go out, and some of the late ones or those who had gone to clear a few things first came in. I don't think we even reached the second CD, everyone just gave up watching, sadly. *Sigh* That was the bunch of people I was stuck with for three weeks.

During the rest days, we also occasionally got to play other activities, we got to play bastketball twice and touch rugby once. It was quite enjoyable and I turned out to be quite good at basketball, despite what they say about swimmers being the most clumsy athletes on land. In fact, I got a 100% 2 point shot percentage! In spite of the fact I was playing a defensive position. (Note: The fact that I only made two shots, once each game, does NOT matter, contrary to what most people think...)

On the last week, one of the squads of the China Synchro team came, and it finally became enjoyable to go to the pool. :D I managed to get a picture of them, but unfortunately they were looking in a different direction. Wasn't exactly easy considering that they trained at roughly the same times as us and I wasn't exactly carrying a camera trying to snap a shot of them. Besides, I wasn't about to carry a camera through training to get a shot of them. I also managed to get a video clip of a few of them on the last day. Heh heh! :D Which was better, but the lighting wasn't so good. *Sigh* Oh well. Better luck next time.

We also got to go to Long men during the first week and the Jiu Xiang limestone caves on the last week. Both of which were quite nice. Unfortunately, only a handful of people appreciated the limestone caves, reminds me of my sec3 class when we went there earlier this year. Haha...

Finally, I'd like to commend Andrew Chong who was the only other guy to have watched Singing in the Rain in the WHOLE bunch. *Gasp* Yes, I know, Singing in the Rain, the Movie none the less! No one else watched it. Not even the musical! That was the bunch I spent 3 weeks with.

This week, I started playing Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, yes old game, but it's really, really good. Except I got stuck at a few areas and had to drop back to a walkthrough... Errr... *Cough*, *Cough*, so no one's perfect...

And Last, but not least, I have started trying to get the old Sam and Max clips. Yes! They are available on Kazaa! They're not that hard to get, despite the fact that most people don't understand the show! Yay!

Posted by Ming at 09:10 PM | Comments (1)